Unbound (Forbidden Bond Book 1)(15)

Tessa slept restlessly on the sofa after dozing off while watching TV.  She sat up with a jolt and let out a little gasp. Tessa snatched the  phone from its cradle and called Danielle, but it went to voice mail.  She paused to calm her voice before leaving a message.

"Dani, give me a call as soon as you can. I was thinking that maybe you  could come home one weekend soon. Love you." She hung up and ran  upstairs to dig for a box hidden in the back of her closet. She sat on  her closet floor, holding the old shoebox on her crossed legs. She  closed her eyes and sat there taking deep breaths. "Just relax," she  told herself. "Don't jump to conclusions." Once she crossed that line,  there would be no turning back. She would hold off as long as she could  before making that phone call, but she dug out the number she needed and  programmed it into her cell phone.

She returned the box to its hiding place. Then she jumped when the phone  rang. It was Danielle returning her call. "Hello, sweetheart, how are  you doing?" Anxiety laced through her tone.

Danielle's voice was shaking. "I'm on the way home, Mommy. I'll be there in an hour." She hung up.

Tessa sat back down on the floor of her closet. She stared at the wall and waited. The time had come.





When Dani got home that night, she found her mother sitting on the floor  of her walk-in closet with her head in her hands and her cell phone in  her lap. They didn't talk about what had brought her home or what had  caused Tessa to hole up in the closet. Dani helped her up off the floor,  and they stood holding each other. They crawled into Tessa's bed  wordlessly. Her mother held her all night, just like she had when Dani  was a child.

The next morning Tessa made a big breakfast and they ate in silence.  Each waited for the other to start. Dani really didn't know why she'd  come home. She only knew that her mother would help sort out the  confusion. So why couldn't she get the words out? The phone rang and  Tessa went to answer it.         

     



 

"Hello?" Tessa turned to look at Dani and mouthed, "Lucas."

Dani shook her head vigorously and mouthed, "I'm not here."

"No, Lucas, she's not home," Tessa lied and listened to Lucas's  response. "I know her car is here, but she isn't. Can I give her a  message?"

"I'll tell her. Good-bye." She hung up the phone and returned to the  table. "Lucas said he is very sorry and to please give him a call,"  Tessa relayed the message. "And I will wait until you're ready to tell  me what's going on, sweetheart." Then she went back to eating her  breakfast.

They did the dishes-Tessa washing and Dani drying-as they always had.  Dani was thinking about how simple life had been just a month before,  and she couldn't shake the feeling that it would never be that way  again. Sadness began to well up in her chest, and she became consumed by  the events of the recent weeks. The tears spilled down her cheeks, and  she sat on the floor, leaning against the cabinets. Sobs began to shake  her body, and she became swamped by all the fear that had been building  up in her heart.

Something was wrong with her. She was somehow different, and it was  terrifying. She'd felt this way ever since her fight with Lucas before  she left for school. She'd thought she was going crazy then. Since then  it had only gotten worse. How could she explain something to her mother  that she herself couldn't understand? All she knew for sure was that she  was somehow changing.



Tessa sat on the floor, taking Dani's hand in hers. She turned to face  her daughter and was startled by her eyes. Her irises had gone jet black  with no visible trace of her usual beautiful ice blue. Her eyes looked  just like her father's eyes when he was emotional. His eyes had also  turned when he fed or when they made love. Extreme emotions and need  were his triggers. Tessa said nothing to alert Dani to the difference.

"Mom, I don't know what to do. I don't know what's wrong with me. I  don't know why I can't get my head on straight, and I don't know what I  think you're supposed to do about it, but I need help." She sobbed the  words through bouts of hiccupping tears.

"I need you to be more specific for me. What does this have to do with  Lucas? How did he know you were home?" Tessa tried to sort out what was  going on with Dani without giving away anything Dani didn't need to know  yet. Dani gave her a blow-by-blow description of the situation with  Chase and Lucas.

Tessa was actually a little relieved. Dani's rant sounded mostly like  the problem was the stress that transferring colleges had put on her  relationship with Lucas. Tessa could deal with those kinds of problems.  But the state of Dani's eyes was another situation altogether, and for  that she would need backup.

"Sweetheart, this really is to be expected. You and Lucas were joined at  the hip for two years. Now that there's a little distance between you,  you'll both have to figure out who you are individually. Boys aren't as  mature as we are, so they have more difficulty. That's no excuse for his  behavior, but that likely has more to do with the people he is filling  his free time with now that you're gone. Do you think you're going to be  able to get past what happened yesterday?" Tessa watched Dani mull that  over.

"I don't know. He was so mean, and I really don't know what happened.  Maybe he doesn't want to be with me anymore. Maybe the distance is too  far to maintain a relationship." Dani sighed.

"Do you want to find out what happened? I can tell you, judging by the  conversation I had with him, that he still wants to be with you. He's  made some mistakes, and you're going to have to deal with him either  way." Tessa hoped that wouldn't happen until Dani got her emotions under  control, because those eyes were enough to freak anybody out.

"I guess, but it might take me a while to get over it, and I feel like  that will just make the situation worse. If he can't handle the distance  between us now, how will he deal with me needing more space to get past  this hurt?"

"Tell me more about Chase," Tessa pried.

"Chase is beautiful. Being near him makes me crazy, because I want to  touch him, and I can't do that. Being away from him makes me crazy,  because I want to touch him and I can't. And he smells like sunshine and  happiness," Dani blurted.

"He smells like what?" Tessa raised one questioning eyebrow.

"I know. I know it's crazy, but I swear he smells like sunshine, and I  can smell him before I see him. He came to find me yesterday, and I knew  he was on the other side of the door," Dani admitted sheepishly. "I  think I'm going crazy, Mom." She hung her head again.         

     



 

"I see. That actually isn't crazy. Your father had quite a sense of  smell. He always said I smelled like vanilla." She looked away from  Dani, already knowing the answer and fearing the consequences of keeping  her daughter in the dark for so long. "Does anybody else smell  strongly?"

"I have been able to smell a lot of odd stuff lately. Everybody has a  smell, but some people smell like food and some people are more like  plants and flowers." Dani leaned into her mother and smiled. "You do  smell like vanilla."

An odd look crossed Dani's face, and Tessa knew she was surprised to  hear her speak of her father. "I guess I did inherit some stuff from  him."

"You got a lot from your father. You have his hair, and some of your  expressions are totally his. You look very much like him, actually. You  just got stuck with my eyes and height." Tessa stared off into the  distance, as if she could see him standing on the other side of the  kitchen table.

"You never told me that," Dani whispered and ran her hand through her hair.

"I fear there are a lot of things I haven't told you, but now is not the time to start my confessions."

"Why not tell me now?" Dani scoffed.

"Because Lucas is about to knock on the door, and I think you should  talk to him." Tessa pointed toward the large mirror above the table in  the foyer. From where they sat on the kitchen floor, they could see that  Lucas was pacing on the porch.

"I'm not going to tell you who you should choose, but I'd be interested  to see what might happen with Mr. Sunshine. Those were some powerful  feelings you were talking about, and it has to be hard to ignore  feelings that strong. Just be honest with both of them, no matter what  you decide."

Tessa took one more look at Dani to see if her eyes had returned to  normal. Everything was in order, except for the obvious tracks of tears.  Tessa went to the door to let Lucas in, directing him toward the  kitchen, and then went to her room to give them some privacy.



Dani listened to Lucas slowly sulk into the kitchen with his shoes  dragging on the hardwood floor. Dani faced away from the door, still  sitting on the floor against the cabinet. He sat in the spot her mother  had just vacated and laid a hand on her shoulder, but Dani jerked away.